Govt is confident it has the required number of votes for passage

Now opens the final chapter in the bitter debate over Hong Kong electoral reform, as the government prepares to table its reform bill today, while police brace for demonstrations by opponents and supporters outside the Legislative Council (LegCo).

The government is confident its reform package will get about 45 votes, with support from the Democratic Party (DP) and a few pan-democrat lawmakers, well above the required 40 votes to pass the bill when it comes to a vote tomorrow.

Police will be out in force. Tuesday, they installed tiers of steel barriers, to keep protestors from disrupting council proceedings.

Late Monday, close to 80 percent of DP members endorsed the 2012 electoral reforms as set out by the administration, at an extraordinary general meeting.

However, it is uncertain whether all nine DP lawmakers will vote in favor of the proposals. Some Democratic Party lawmakers have protested that a vote in favor of the package would be a violation of their 2008 LegCo election pledge. In the absence of assurance of a timetable for abolition of the functional constituency, DP lawmakers Andrew Cheng and James To, together with founding chairman Martin Lee, said they find it hard to vote for the package. Cheng and To said they will consider their options, including submitting their resignations from the party.

A threshold of 40 votes (i.e., two-thirds of LegCo) is required to carry the political reform. On top of 36 votes from the pro-establishment camp, it may obtain a maximum of 47 votes, if all nine DP lawmakers (including Cheng and To), Frederick Fung from the Association for Democracy and People's Livelihood and Joseph Lee Kok-long from the health services sector vote in favor.

Constitutional reform quite unexpectedly triggered an internal crisis within the DP. The rift within the broader pan-democratic camp is also widening, with 11 of the 23 members backing the government package. The remainder are intractably opposed. The opposing votes will come from the Civic Party (5), League of Social Democrats (3), and Cyd Ho, Lee Cheuk-yan and Peter Cheung from the social welfare constituency.

Speaking on morning radio shows after an arduous night, DP chairman Albert Ho said the party's endorsement for the electoral reform is a historic decision for the constitutional development of Hong Kong.

Since the road to democracy is a rocky one, it is essential to achieve concrete results at certain stages, he said. Even if the party vetoes the reform, the functional constituency will remain, but the electorate that will choose the five new FC seats will be much larger. Ho called the broadened electorate a de facto direct election.

Ho also said he was confident he could persuade To and Cheng to change their minds and stay on. He noted their friendship and their cooperative endeavors that have spanned over two decades.

Executive Councilor Anthony Cheung noted that the majority of DP members support the reform package. A former vice-chairman of the DP, he said the pan-democratic camp has not spilt and it is to be expected that there will be differing opinions.

In Beijing, Chan Wing-kee, a Standing Committee member of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, expressed satisfaction with the SAR Government for accepting the DP proposal. He also praised the Democratic Party for showing the courage to take an important step forward.

China Daily

(HK Edition 06/23/2010 page1)